You’ll love these Easy to Make Filled Sugar Cookie Cups

I love making sugar cookie cup recipes for holiday parties and cookie exchanges. These Easy to Make Filled Sugar Cookie Cups can be made gluten free and are so yummy that your non-gluten free friends won’t even notice.

Plus there’s no need to worry about the filling taking hours to make or being very expensive to do. With a few shortcuts, cooking up a batch of these Easy to Make Filled Sugar Cookie Cups is easier than you think.

The only special equipment you’ll need for this homemade sugar cookie cup recipe are enough mini cupcake/muffin pans to make 60 cookies, a stand mixer, and maybe some piping bags (see below for a workaround).

Making Easy to Make Filled Sugar Cookie Cups is all about the ingredients

Are you a Kroger shopper? Then you must be aware of their Simple Truth organic and natural products and their Private Selection gourmet and artisan foods. I love both brands because of their high quality and wonderful value compared to similar national brands.

So when making my Easy to Make Filled Sugar Cookie Cups, it was only natural to see what Simple Truth and Private Selection baking ingredients would meet my needs. Just about everything from cooking spray to spices to eggs – easy peasy!

Truthfully, the whole reason I wanted to make this simple filled sugar cup recipe was to use Private Selection fruit filling. I’ve been eyeing jars of it in the baking section for awhile now. It was just as delicious as I thought it would be and using a premade filling took hours off this cookie recipe.

This Mama’s tips for baking up Easy to Make Filled Sugar Cookie Cups

Make sure you use UNSALTED and not salted butter. Salted butter won’t bake the same way.

You can soften butter by placing in the microwave for 10 seconds at 50% power. Or place the stick of butter in your pocket or bra for half an hour. Seriously!

Easy to Make Filled Sugar Cookie Cups can be made with Simple Truth Organic Unbleached Flour or gluten free flour. Unfortunately, there isn’t a Simple Truth all purpose gluten free flour – yet.

I used both Private Selection Tart Cherry and White Peach Fruit Filling and Private Selection Oregon Triple Berry Fruit Filing just to have variety in the pictures. For this sugar cookie cups filling recipe, you’ll just need one 22-ounce jar of fruit filling.

If you’re using Private Selection Tart Cherry and White Peach Fruit Filling, you’ll need to puree it in a mini or regular sized food processor or high speed blender, as there are large chunks of cherry in the fruit filling.

Use the back of a round metal teaspoon to shape the sugar cookie cups. Since you have to re-press the sugar cookie cups when they come right out of the oven, a metal teaspoon will soon get hot.

Be careful not to burn yourself. If you have a plastic teaspoon, be careful not to melt it! You may want to check your drawers for a mortar and pestle, as the pestle may work just as well. (Mine was too thick.) Or maybe the bottom of a small shot glass would work!

If you don’t have piping bags, place fruit filling in a locking baggie. Press out the air and zip the bag shut. Snip off one end of the baggie to make a small hole.

Then carefully pipe the fruit filling into your cookie cups. You can also spoon the filling in to the cookie cups, but I find piping to be quicker and tidier.

To make sugar cookie cup dough:

On low, beat in eggs, vanilla, and orange zest. Then add in flour by the cupful until thoroughly mixed in.

Form sugar cookie dough into a ball. Cover and chill dough for 30 minutes.

To make cookie cup filling:

If using cherry and peach fruit filling, puree in a food process or high speed blender to finely chop up any fruit pieces.

Add brandy, cinnamon and nutmeg to fruit filling and stir until thoroughly blended.

To bake sugar cookie cups:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Coat 1 1/4-inch mini cupcake pan with cooking spray.

Remove dough from refrigerator. Using a small cookie dough scooper, scoop enough sugar cookie dough to make 1 1/4-inch balls. Place balls into prepared cupcake/muffin pans and flatten. Then take the back of a round teaspoon measuring spoon to press the dough into a cup.

Bake 10 to 12 minutes at 350 degrees F until the edges of the sugar cookie cups begin to brown. Remove mini cupcake/muffin pans from oven and quickly re-press the back of a round teaspoon in the center of each cookie cup. (Be careful not to burn yourself.)

Let the cookie cups cool in the pans for 10 to 15 minutes. Run a small knife around the edge of each cookie cup to release it from the pan, if needed. Cool completely on wire racks.

To fill sugar cookie cups:

Place fruit filling in a piping bag or a resealable plastic baggie with a hole snipped from one corner. Squeeze fruit filling into each sugar cookie cup.